So, right now I am doing this show at a local community theatre called Squabbles. I play a character named Sol Wasserman, and I have a tiny problem as an actor. I keep calling another character by the wrong name. His name is Abe Dreyfus, and I keep calling him either Drayfus, or (even worse), Wasserman. I tell you this in order to point out: I have a world of sympathy for William Hartnell every time he calls Ian Chesterton by the wrong name.

But it's still dang funny.

Anyway, today I watched the last two episodes of The Sensorites. Let's talk about that.

Kidnap

Yesterday's episode ended with the Doctor being attacked by an unseen monster in the dark. Today opened with the Doctor being rescued by Ian and Susan, who find him collapsed on the floor with his jacket torn to shreds  That destroyed jacket will become very important later. Fortunately, the Doctor is not seriously injured, just stunned. They leave his destroyed jacket behind and beat a hasty exit.

Meanwhile mister Tea-Partier City Administrator continues to threaten the Second Elder, and ends up killing him. Dun dun DUN! He decides to use this to his own advantage, by framing the humans for the murder. He and his accomplice rush off to see the First Elder, who is already meeting with the Doctor, Ian, and Susan, and who has just given the Doctor a new cloak to replace his destroyed jacket. The accomplice spins a tale about how he witnessed the Doctor murder the Second Elder by pulling a weapon from his jacket. You know, the jacket that was destroyed one paragraph before and which the First Elder himself replaced. The First Elder sees right through the transparent lie, and sends the accomplice off to jail. Still, although the City Administrator is pig-ignorant, he is very crafty. He recovers quickly and lets his accomplice take the fall while he himself weasels his way into a promotion as the new Second Elder.

Meanwhile, ZombieJohn has been cured and is now just John. He remembers that he is engaged to NavigatorLady, and he is very happy. But he also clear-headed enough to let Susan and NavigatorLady know that the former City Administrator is the bad guy. In the meantime, the Doctor and Ian have mounted a new expedition into the aqueduct, armed with junk weapons and a faulty map, both deliberately altered by the new Second Elder. As NavigatorLady rushes off to warn the First Elder, she is kidnapped by the bad guys. Who could have possibly seen a kidnapping coming in this episode? (Besides anyone who read the title card at the opening, I mean...)

A Desperate Venture

Jacqueline Hill has returned from vacation. I mean, um, Barbara has been sent for from the spaceship. The bad guy forces NavigatorLady to write a literal Dear John letter to NotZombieJohn, saying she has returned to the spaceship. Of course, both NavigatorLady and the First Elder know the letter must be falsely written under duress, because the transport shuttle had already been in use shuttling Barbara down to the Sensosphere.  Knowing that the Doctor and Ian have been sent off with damaged equipment, Barbara and NotZombieJohn rush off to their rescue. With the First Elder's aid, Susan uses one of the mental disc things to guide Susan through the aqueduct tunnels. As it turns out, there are three humans from the previous expedition who have been living in the tunnels for years waging a secret war against the Sensorites by poisoning their water supply. They have all gone quite mad, obsessed with the great riches they believe they will accrue once they have eliminated the planet's population.

In the end, the duplicitous Second Elder née City Administrator is found out and exiled to the wilderness. The three insane humans are captured and handed over to PilotDude, NavigatorLady, and NotZombieJohn so that they can be returned to Earth for treatment. The lock to the TARDIS is returned, and our intrepid adventurers are up and away to their next adventure.

Although I thought the ending to the story was a bit abrupt, other than that I quite enjoyed this entire story. What an unexpected treat!

Tomorrow: The Reign of Terror!

STATS:

Doctor(s): First
Companion(s): Ian Chesterton, Susan Foreman, Barbara Wright
Episode(s): Kidnap, A Desperate Venture
The Doctor Mispronounces Ian's Name: 1
Steps Walked: 6,665 today, 126,597 total
Distance Walked: 3.05 miles today, 55.93 miles total
Weight: 299.54 lbs (five day moving average), net change -7.76 lbs